Further in to the discussion with Smiley, we talked about the far future. Let's say, for arguement's sake, that the far left wins out, and in 1000 years we're all happy on soma or something, everbody is fed, the producers produce, and the moochers live off welfare or whatever. We haven't colonized space because it costs too much and takes away from the ability to make the lowest common denominator happy. Let's say that an alien race visits Earth. If they do, it's because they didn't go the same route, in which case they won't care about peace at any cost. That means they may very well be aggressive and see Earthlings as weak and easy to take advantage of. Or, the Right/Libertarians could win out, we colonize space, and when we meet up with aliens (and I truly think they are out there somewhere), we'll be able to deal with it. Far, far future speculation, but worth thinking about. There is, of course, a lot of science fiction that deals with first contact, but probably not so much that relates it to current day political ideology. Perhaps that would be a good niche for me to write a story about.

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